


You Watch

by Anonymous



Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternative Universe - FBI, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Homophobia, Hostage Situations, M/M, Serial Killers, Slurs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2019-08-20
Packaged: 2020-09-19 00:15:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20321890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: The serial killer FBI Agent Hamid Kadivar is hunting sends him a hostage video featuring his fiancé Raoul.(This was trashy enough that I didn't want it to be under my name, and anyone who knows me knows that I am generally not a trash-averse individual. Tread carefully, all ye who enter here).





	You Watch

Hamid’s shoulders started to droop as he drove home. Without work to actively focus him, his mind was free to dwell, and he knew that letting it slide into those grim corners wasn’t healthy or helpful. 

Once he was walking up his driveway, though, he felt his spirits and his posture rise. He was determined to leave his work at the door, if only because he didn’t want to bring that darkness around Raoul.

“I’m home, love!” he called out once he was inside. 

He was a little surprised when he didn’t hear Raoul’s “Hi, babe!” He was almost always home before Hamid, especially with this case keeping him late nearly every day. 

Raoul had assured him it was fine. He’d made it clear that he wasn’t going to complain about being left alone, because his boyfriend was hunting a serial killer. Hamid could tell that Raoul missed him, though. He regretted the time they spent apart, as well. What was worst, as much sense as he knew it made, was the decision to push back the wedding at least a few months. 

He locked the door. “Raoul, are you here?” he called, as he walked further into the house. There was no response, and the house wasn’t that big. He checked his phone, but found no texts or missed calls from his fiancé.  
  
Usually, Raoul would have contacted him if something unexpected came up that kept him late at the hospital. He knew that Hamid was prone to–probably excessive–worry and typically indulged him. Hamid reminded himself, though, that volunteering at a VA medical center meant crises might occasionally arise that required longer hours. 

He set his briefcase down on the living room table, then opened Raoul’s contact on his phone.

_Just got home. I’m sorry not to see you. I hope you’ll be home soon. Please text me when you can. I love you, dearest. _

Raoul normally festooned his texts with hearts and smiley faces. Hamid couldn’t bring himself to go quite that far; instead, he added a single heart.

On an average day, Raoul would greet him with dinner and conversation and pull him into the living room to catch up on late night shows. He definitely made sure that Hamid left all of his work at the door. Without Raoul’s good influence, he headed up to his office on the second floor. He dropped into his desk chair with a mixture between a sigh and a groan. Whenever he would make wry comments about his age, Raoul would always roll his eyes. 

“You’re not that old.”

“Oh, that’s very easy for you to say.”

“Because it’s true, you’re just overdramatic.”

“You’re right: I still have seven years until retirement. I’m in the flower of my youth.”

Raoul always cheated by ending arguments or disagreements with kisses.

Hamid smiled as he opened his laptop, then clicked open a Gmail tab. He yawned as he opened an email from his bank. Regretting that he hadn’t remembered to get a cup of coffee before heading upstairs, he clicked on a link.

The screen went black.

“Oh, dammit,” he muttered. He saw that power cord was attached to the laptop, which meant it had probably been knocked out of the outlet, which would require getting on hands and knees to plug it back in. Unless something else was wrong with the computer, and goddammit, he was too tired to deal with that right now.

He had just pushed back his chair when the screen blinked back to life. It was filled with an image of a person sitting in a chair in front of a bare, stained concrete wall. For a second, Hamid was confused. Then, his stomach lurched.

Raoul.

Raoul’s arms were bound to his sides with duct tape. His legs were also taped shut, and he was tied to a metal chair with ropes. He was naked and covered in bruises and scratches. His hair was a loose tangle, and there was a ball gag between his teeth. When his head shifted, Hamid could see that it was a video. He could hear the background whir of the camera’s motor and a muted beeping noise.

“Raoul!” he shouted instinctively.

On the screen, Raoul looked around blearily, before his eyes settled straight ahead. They widened, and Raoul let out a muffled grunt.

Wildly, Hamid wondered if it was a live, two-way feed, and Raoul was looking at him through another screen. Instinct made him scan every inch of the frame. To Raoul’s left was a tall sawhorse, around four feet tall. There were leather straps, like antiquated hospital restraints. The lighting seemed fluorescent. Hamid thought it might have been a garage. He realized with a stab of frustration that he had left his phone on the table downstairs. He had to decide whether it was worth rushing away to grab it to call the police.

Before he could think, though, a figure walked into frame, closer to the camera. The man was average height and build, wearing a black balaclava, black sweatshirt, and gray sweatpants. 

Hamid’s heart somehow began to beat even faster. It couldn’t be.

_Dear God, please. Please, no. Don’t let this happen. Please. Please!_

He walked forward until only his torso was visible. The beeping sound stopped, and then the man walked back until he was visible from the knees up. “Hello, Agent Kadivar. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you who I am. Though, then again, you might not be as smart as I thought you are if you fell for that email. Really? And you’re supposed to be an FBI agent?”

“You let him go,” Hamid demanded, even as his voice trembled. “He has nothing to do with this. Just let him go!”

“Huh,” the man said. “Seems like I can see you but not hear you. But, it seems like you can hear and see us on this end, and that’s what really matters.” He turned and then walked away from the camera, Towards Raoul. 

“No! No! No!” He slammed his palms onto the desk, his body vibrating with rage and fear. Raoul had never been in more danger, and there was nothing Hamid could do to protect him.

“Mfh! Mfh!” Raoul shook his head frantically and tried to lean away from the man approaching him. 

The man–Hamid was trying to pretend he didn’t already know who it was–put the bag down on the ground. He knelt and unzipped the bag. “Don’t look away from this, Hamid.”(He pronounced it to rhyme with “Ahmed,” but Hamid barely noticed). “If you look away, you’re only going to hurt your little boy here.” When he straightened up, he was holding a compact stun gun. 

Hamid somehow managed to feel more sick. Memories flashed through his head of crime scenes and autopsies. The media had named him the “Stun Gun Killer,” after the way he incapacitated and then tortured his victims–though the stun gun was only one method along with many others. 

The man grabbed Raoul by the hair and forced him up straight. He jabbed the stun gun into Raoul’s shoulder and then fired it. Raoul howled behind the gag. After holding it there a few seconds, he moved the barbs to another point and fired again. Now, Hamid could notice the pairs of small, round burns littering his body. He squeezed his eyes shut as the man shocked Raoul under the chin.

“No. I told you Hamid: your only job here is to watch.”

Raoul screamed.

Hamid opened his eyes to see the masked man holding the stun gun to Raoul’s genitals.

“No! Oh, God, please, no!” He knew the man couldn’t hear his pleading, but he couldn’t stop himself. “Please, leave him alone!”

After what had to be ten seconds–it felt like ten years–the stun gun was pulled away. Raoul was left twitching and sobbing.

“Shut up,” the man said almost casually. He slapped Raoul across the face. Raoul seemed to do his best to control his noises of pain, as the man grabbed him by his hair.

“Raoul…” Hamid said around the knot in his throat. 

“This is your fucking boyfriend’s fault, you know that, right?” he said, addressing Raoul. He shook his head violently. “You wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him. You just keep that in mind, huh, you little faggot.” Raoul’s eyes were squeezed shut as tears tracked down his cheeks. “Hey!” He jabbed the stun gun into Raoul’s cheek. “Open your fucking eyes! You’re gonna look at him, so he knows what he’s doing to you.” When Raoul kept his eyes shut, the man shook him again. “Open your eyes, or I’m gonna have to shock your useless dick again. Look in the camera.”

Whimpering, Raoul opened his eyes. His gaze locked on Hamid’s over God knew how many miles. Hamid assumed that the man was correct that there was a monitor displaying footage from his webcam in their location. 

“I’m sorry,” Hamid enunciated as clearly as possible. “I’ll find you. I’ll find you.” He hoped desperately that Raoul would be able to read his lips. Though, even if he could, Hamid knew it wasn’t as if he could provide Raoul with any comfort.

“You know, it wasn’t hard finding you. I found that article about that militia case. I thought I’d get my hands on a pretty wife. Instead I got stuck with this.” He shocked Raoul on his ear, then his forehead. Hamid could barely hear the man make a close-mouthed chuckle. “I do like the hair, though. Thanks for that.” The man tugged hard on Raoul’s hair, then again until a clump came out. Raoul screamed.

All of the victims had been white women, mostly blonde, in their early twenties with long hair, shoulder length and below. The killer would haphazardly hack off his victim’s hair, sometimes taking out chunks of scalp. The women would be injected with household chemicals, not to kill them, but to sicken them and burn their veins. Finally, after usually between 36 and 60 hours of captivity, they would be garotted with wire hangers. During those days of torture, they would be repeatedly raped, beaten, electrocuted, and strangled to the point of unconsciousness.

If the man was comparing Raoul physically to those other victims… 

Hamid’s throat closed. _God, god._ He couldn’t let himself think about what that could mean. He couldn’t.

The man shocked Raoul in the neck repeatedly. Then, he reached into his pocket. Hamid stopped breathing as he pulled out a knife. Standing beside him, the man held the blade to Raoul’s throat. He stared straight into the camera, and Hamid desperately wished he could find some clue in the man’s expression. Only when Raoul let out a high, keening sound of pain did Hamid realize that the knife had broken the skin.

“No!” Hamid screamed. 

The man pulled the knife away, leaving a cut just to the side of his Adam’s apple trickling blood. Hamid could barely feel a shade of something like relief. At least, _at least_, Raoul was still alive. That was all he could cling to. 

The man instead sawed through the ropes holding Raoul to the chair. Raoul slumped forward out of the chair, seemingly unable to hold himself up. The man let him drop to his knees. He curled onto his side in a fetal position, his bound hands pressed to his chest. Hamid could just make out the sound of him crying. 

“No,” Hamid choked around the hard lump in his throat. He was crying himself. He needed to be there with Raoul. It was his job to take care of him. Raoul trusted him, and he’d failed. “Raoul…”

“Aw, honey,” the man mocked. “Tired already? Come on: we have more of a show to put on for your boyfriend.”

Hamid could barely make out Raoul’s muffled, “Please…” around the gag. The fact that it was going to go unanswered stabbed Hamid in the heart.

The man leaned down and grabbed a fistful of Raoul’s hair. Raoul shrieked as he was dragged across the floor. 

“Shut up, you little bitch!” 

When they were beside the sawhorse, he wrenched his hand upwards. Raoul clumsily got his feet under him, so his scalp wasn’t ripped off. The man grabbed him by the back of his neck and shoved him into the sawhorse. Hamid remembered the image of the women’s chests and backs rubbed raw, embedded with large splinters. He registered the blood stains on the wood. 

The man cut the tape off of Raoul’s wrists. The moment one of his arms was free, Raoul flung an elbow back. It didn’t connect with anything, but the man still sucker-punched him, causing him to spin sideways and that collapse to the ground. Raoul was ragdoll limp as the man hauled him back up his hair and slammed his chest into the wood. Hamid held his breath until he saw Raoul struggle slightly as he was locked into the restraints. 

The doorbell rang. Hamid’s eyes jerked to the office door. He gritted his teeth. There was someone close at hand who might be able to help; who might be able to at least do something. He couldn’t move, though. Any action could only hurt Raoul.

“Hey!”

Hamid’s eyes jerked back to the screen, just as the man shoved the stun gun into Raoul’s neck and gave him another prolonged shock. Raoul yelped and spasmed, clinging desperately to the wood. The doorbell was still ringing.

“I told you: you’re gonna fucking watch this!” Standing behind Raoul, the man punched him hard in the middle of the back. He hit him again and again, until Raoul’s pained yells turned into a harsh groan as the wind was knocked out of him. One of the man’s hands disappeared behind Raoul’s body. Hamid realized what was happening, but didn’t let himself believe it until he saw the man tug down his sweatpants.

The bell had stopped.

Hamid’s gaze remained locked on Raoul’s face, tears streaming from his tightly-shut eyes. He wished to God that he could do something, anything, to comfort him. There was nothing though. He was helpless. Useless to protect the man he had pledged his life to. 

The man spat into his hand and started working on himself. He laughed. “I’ve only ever fucked girls in the ass before. Let’s see how this measures up. I hope you’re not too loose from getting fucked by your boyfriend.” He kicked Raoul’s legs apart. While Raoul was still getting his feet under him, the man gripped his hip with one hand and forced himself in with the other.

Raoul’s scream, barely muffled by the gag, shattered Hamid’s heart. He wanted to shut his eyes or turn away, but by now he knew that trying to protect himself would only hurt Raoul. There was no way out of this hell. 

The man groaned. “Shit. God, that almost fucking hurts. Your boyfriend must not be giving you much, huh?” He grabbed Raoul’s hips with both hands as he kept pushing in. He paused with another bestial groan, head thrown back in pleasure, before he started thrusting. “Fuck, I should have done this sooner,” he grunted after nearly a minute of brutal fucking. “Or is that your fi-an-cé?” 

He pronounced each syllable mockingly, as if it was the funniest thing he’d ever heard. “Is that what that pretty ring meant? Whatta you think your fiancé thinks about you now? You’re fucking disgusting, you pathetic little piece of shit. You want me to tell him how you puked your guts out when I kicked you around? How I ground your fucking face into it? How about how you pissed yourself when I just showed you my gun? Most of the cunts I took care of weren’t such pathetic bitches. You probably make him fucking sick. I’m sure he doesn’t wanna fucking marry you now, bitch.”

Raoul’s head was slumped, his body shoved forward with each thrust. His fists were clenched tight. His yelps and moans of pain must have grown too quiet and infrequent, because the man grabbed him by the hair and yanked his head up.

“Look at him! Look at how sick you make him. Or maybe he’s enjoying it. Maybe he likes seeing you get fucked by a real man.”

For a while, Hamid hoped that Raoul would keep his eyes shut, but then they opened and their gazes locked.

Raoul’s face was contorted in pain. Hamid couldn’t begin to unravel all of the emotions in his reddened eyes. There was fear, grief, pain. He didn’t know if he was imagining it, but he thought that he could see Raoul silently begging him for help.

“I love you,” Hamid said, his voice coming out almost like a sob. “I love you, Raoul. Dearest, I love you so much.” It was barely anything, but at that moment it was all that Hamid could offer. “I promise I’ll find you. I promise you’re going to be alright. We’ll get you out of there. I love you.”

He didn’t know how much Raoul would be able to read his lips through the feed and with everything he was suffering. Something must have come through, though, because Raoul nodded again and again. It was the closest either of them could come to comfort. 

“Kadivar?”

Hamid’s head snapped to the side. Erik Destler, the consulting criminologist, was standing in the doorway. He must have become concerned when Hamid didn’t answer the front door and broken in. His mouth hung open, obviously unable to process what he was seeing and hearing. 

“Hey! I said look!”

He quickly turned back to the screen, horrified at the thought of how Raoul would be punished for his moment of distraction. There was a hand wrapped around Raoul’s throat, yanking him backwards. Raoul was choking and gasping, eyes wide with panic. He could see the man’s fingernails digging into Raoul’s exposed flesh. There were already dark bruises around his throat.

“You let him go! Get away from him!”

“Kadivar, what the hell is going on?”

“Raoul,” Hamid said, trusting that the man would only be noticing his agonized expression and not reading his lips. “A video of Raoul. Live feed. The killer has him. He’s… shit, he’s…”

“I’ll call the police.”

“Tell them not to enter the room. He has a visual on me. He’ll kill Raoul if he sees anything.”

“Right.”

He completely tuned out what Erik said next. He’d done what he could, now there was nothing to focus on other than Raoul being hurt. The man was still choking him. Raoul’s face was turning red. Hamid told himself that with one hand and from that position, it was likely Raoul could still breathe somewhat. It also wouldn’t fit the killer’s M.O. to strangle him to death like this. Logic didn’t provide much comfort, though, when Raoul was in pain.

“God, your bitch is tight on my dick,” he growled. “Maybe next I should send you a video of me choking him on my cock.” After what felt like forever, the man let go of Raoul’s throat. He returned to gripping Raoul’s hips as he slammed in and out of him.

The stream of threats, taunts, and slurs toward Hamid and Raoul continued, now more infrequent between inarticulate grunts and moans. Raoul was limp aside from his hands squeezing the wood. Hamid could sense Erik lingering in the doorway, but knew better than to tear his eyes away from the screen.

As the man’s pace picked up, he snatched a handful of Raoul’s hair. The way that he grabbed it ripped the hair off of his scalp. Raoul’s head snapped forward at the same time the man behind him threw his back.

He all-but roared as his hips stuttered to a stop, drawing a sharp, choked sound from Raoul. The man grunted and thrust a few more times. When he pulled out, Raoul whimpered. He pulled up his sweatpants, slapped Raoul’s ass hard, and then finally stepped away from him. 

“Fuck,” he panted. “That was good. I gotta give it to you, Hamid. You got good taste.” He kicked the back of Raoul’s leg, seemingly just to hear Raoul yelp in pain as he buckled.

Hamid realized that his face was covered in tears. He hadn’t cried since he was a child. It made sense that he would now, because he was as helpless as one. 

The man walked up to the camera. He pressed his face close to the lens. “Okay, now you’re probably wondering what you’re supposed to do,” he said, panting. “What I want you to do so you can get your baby boy back. Well, sorry. I already got what I want. You’re gonna have to just fuckin’ live with it. Goodbye.”

He reached up a hand, and then all of a sudden the feed cut out, Hamid’s horrified expression reflected on the black screen.

“No!” Hamid slammed his fists onto the desk. “You bastard!” He jumped to his feet as if there was something he could do.

“Kadivar.”

Hamid kept his eyes locked on the screen as Erik rushed over to him, then gripped his shoulder tight.

“I’ve contacted the police. They’re sending a tech team here and also officers to the VA building. When did you last hear from him?”

“Text… texted him around one. He said he would be home at five-thirty.” He ran a hand over his wet, flushed face.

“Hamid, I’m…” Sorry. There weren’t any words for the situation, and Erik had never been a master of them when it came to emotions.

“On the wall.” He cleared his throat, shaking loose a tear. “There was a sticker from an extermination company. If we can cross-check that against the partial plate the witness gave us…”

“Right. Did you record your screen?”

Hamid gritted his teeth. “I didn’t think about it. Dammit. I don’t know if it would have even worked. But I didn’t try.”

“Don’t.” Erik didn’t mince words. “What…did you see?”

“He… shocked him. He’d beaten him. He… God, Erik, you heard. Don’t make me say it.”

“Were there any specific threats? Demands?”

Hamid shook his head. “Just revenge. He didn’t even know about Raoul. He thought I had a wife. He made it seem like he was making an exception… assaulting Raoul. It was just to hurt me. God…”

“Whatever you’re thinking isn’t going to help,” Erik wasn’t natural at providing comfort. In a way, though, this bluntness might be what he needed.

“Right.” He took a deep breath. “You’re right.”

“We have a solid lead. We know that Raoul is alive. We’ll find them.”

Hamid wasn’t sure. He knew that Erik wasn’t as sure as he was trying to sound either. But, he was right that giving into panic and despair wouldn’t help. He needed to keep his head together if he was going to find Raoul.

And, he was going to find him.

He nodded. “Right.”


End file.
